Leaning Toward NOT-Gold Medal Behavior.

PRESENT...

So, this is me:

They look happy in that photo. And he ”loved” it on Facebook. But he browsed me. But they look happy in that photo. And he “loved” it on Facebook. But he browsed me. Two years later…

You know the drill.

Today I remembered something: Chi always looks like he’s doing better than he is. Even when he was with me.

As a general rule of thumb, you can pretty much count on that one.

 

The last time he browsed me on Linked In: sometime around Valentine’s Day. (It took me a couple of weeks to discover it, so I can’t be sure exactly when.) I browsed him back…but I chickened out and did it in private mode. I was afraid to interfere. He could tell someone browsed him, but he couldn’t be any more sure it was me than I could be sure my anonymous browser was him.

 

I promised myself, if he ever did it again, I’d browse him back, and I wouldn’t cloak. I’d let him know it was me.

 

So, I did that.

 

In case he doesn’t “get it” (he won’t—LOW self-esteem), I put status messages up on my Facebook accounts, not directed at anyone by name, simply saying, I have marching orders not to speak to someone, and if you don’t talk to me, I can’t talk to you.

 

He may never browse me on Facebook. That’s his choice. (If it was even him on Linked In.)

 

Of course, I’ve had to revisit the romance because of the damn novel. Which my Sunday morning writer’s group likes, and bugs me to bring in more of. (Is it any coincidence that I’m finally at this point in the story right about now?)

 

I remember that I love him. I remember that I miss him. I remember just how delightful he can be. And now I just long to be with him again.

 

And here I am, scheming and manipulating.

Not that I would have done more than that. (She said.) Whether to ever speak to me again is, as the tarot cards reported, his choice.

 

But here I am again, So Sure Of What Someone Else Should Do.

 

Just like Rory. And his daughter, and everyone else in his life.

 

Once again, I am slipping into a pernicious control mindset. Because, just like Rory, I neeeeeed him to do something for me. I neeeeeed him to come back and be with me, because I’m sure I can’t be happy without him.

 

Haven’t we already been over this? Don’t we already know this is bad? Don’t we know WHY it’s bad??

You see, that feeling of internal unrest because you want a person and they’re not there—that’s half of Moon opp Neptune. That’s my half of what will kill the relationship—or ANY relationship. That feeling of being so unhappy you’ll do anything. Because whatever is in the rest of your life, it’s just not good enough without the drug of this person.

 

OK, I felt that way about Simon, too, but we were married. And it was a healthy relationship. Or at least, one that worked so well, I didn’t see all the ways I still wasn’t mature.

 

You can’t miss someone so much that the rest of your life is just dust and ashes without them.

Except, unfortunately, you can. And we do. It’s part of loving someone.

 

It certainly was part of loving Simon, and it’s part of loving Chi, too. Except with Simon, there was a real relationship to base that on. With Chi…Heh. Read on.

 

It finally dawned on me what he’s showing me, and what he’s been showing me all along.

 

He is not ready to change what he’s doing; he’s showing me that he wishes he were ready to change what he’s doing.

 

Codependency therapy is scary, and painful. Some of us are afraid that if we really look at some of the things our parents did to us, we’ll never be able to stop crying. Some of us are terrified that those things really were our fault, that we were just rotten little children and we’re still rotten people, and if we had been better little boys and girls and better people, our parents would have loved us and taken better care of us. Some of us are so scared of the tears on other people’s faces, their pain if we ever disappointed them, that it’s easier to just remain in pain ourselves our whole lives, because we know what pain feels like, and we don’t want to cause any to anyone else, ever.

 

Some of us haven’t learned that if another person truly loves us, there’s no way we can really disappoint them.

 

It’s SO much easier to run back into, “What must I do to please others?” (And then regret the consequences. For twenty MORE years.)

 

Pushing this person is harmful. Part of the problem is, he has too many people pushing him already. If I push, too, that just adds to the stress, it doesn’t relieve it.

 

I have spent some time these days studying Nodes of the Moon. The Moon’s Nodes tell you basically what you have already experienced, in childhood, or in a past life, if you believe in that—that’s your South Node—and what your soul incarnated to master in this life. That’s your North Node.

 

I already knew this, but I did stumble upon one astrologer’s unique way of looking at it. In this life, you long and long for your South Node—the best aspects of what you knew in the past. But, unless you master your North Node, you will never get that again in this life in any satisfying fashion. You have to get the good South Node stuff (and, in every childhood, there’s also some BAD South Node stuff—we don’t want that!), THROUGH your North Node “classroom.”

 

I mean, look at Chi. North Node first house, South in seven. Seven is the house of partnership and marriage, the Holy Grail of happy relationship.

 

Ah, but what’s in House One? THE SELF. He’s got to master healthy self-esteem and a healthy self image before the House of Marriage and Partnership is going to be in any way hospitable. (And look at the codependency and the early childhood family problems in the rest of that chart. Woooo.)

 

Look at mine. North Node: House eight, sign of Aries. I’ve been pretty codependent in the past and I’m supposed to become an individual, instead of picking sick people and martyring myself to their problems. I’m trying to master huge transformative experiences, often having to do with a death, some kind of rebirth, inheritance, sex: big, deep, risky experiences that shake humans to their core. Well, there certainly has been an actual death in my life—two big ones—and I have transformed a lot as a result of one of them. And I’ve been a participant in someone else’s big transformative experience. Aries rules a lot of the same issues as the first house: independence, learning to live alone, stand alone, and care for the self alone. Learning to be an individual, instead of submerging the self in relationships and what other people want one to be. And, if you look at all my bad transits to the purported end of my and Chi’s relationship somewhere around 2036, they reflect an abysmal failure in that area on both our parts.

 

MUCH to be avoided.

 

Now look at my South Node. House Two, the House of Worth. Most people think that’s just about money. It’s not. It’s anything of worth—including your SELF worth—and how you value what you are putting out in the world to others. If you do not value it, others won’t, either, and you can end up poor. Which is what I spent many years absolutely terrified of, because I had that low self worth and low self confidence that anything I could do in the world would be good enough for other people in the world of work and commerce. I still feel that way about my writing. (I mean, really. Two hundred thousand books are published every year, and maybe one percent of them sell more than a hundred copies. Who’s gonna give a shit? And why should they?) And look what I was trying to use Chi for two and a half years ago. Not good, huh?

 

I’ve been sort of ashamed of some of the money I’ve made and the things I’ve bought. Aren’t I getting a little out of control? Aren’t I dressing a little too nice these days? Don’t I maybe look a bit silly? Nobody else wears a diamond ring to work unless they’re married or engaged, and maybe not then. Haven’t I maybe bought too many clothes? Do I REALLY need another set of wonderful linen bedsheets? (Hmm: Answer to that one: YEP.) But the advice here is that I’m supposed to be doing this, and I’m supposed to take pleasure in being self-sufficient, and enjoy what I’ve been able to do for myself.

 

You know, if I can do that, my life can be about more than just a relationship that didn’t work out, and I don’t have to put all this harmful pressure on poor Chi.

 

I can see that any relationship is going to go much, much better when a person is capable of doing this. No matter who you’re with. Basically, what this is saying to each of us is, I can have the relationship—whoever it turns out to be with—once I’ve mastered self-sufficiency. (Chi has Aries and Libra, too, just the houses are different and the nodes are switched.) And Chi can have the relationship—whoever it turns out to be with—once he’s mastered codependency and self-esteem. And that’s why our worst transits are saying, from year to year to year, Here’s where you have the CHOICE to master this, here’s where you ELECTED NOT TO, and here are the consequences you will pay.

 

Those are bad. We MUST do our healing and recovery work, even though, even though, even though, even though, it’s the one thing we LEAST WANT TO DO. The one thing you look at and wail, “But I can’t do that!!”  That’s your North Node. That’s the thing we absolutely MUST DO, most of it apart, before we can ever succeed in a relationship, whoever it’s with.

 

But who am I to tell him what he’s READY to do?

 

All I’m trying to do is push him because I neeeeeed him. And there’s a healthy part of that: I know he wants that kind of relationship, and we really were wonderful to each other and got each other in a marvelous way, and every human being wants that! But the unhealthy part of that is, I still think I can’t survive without it, or feel happy in just the life I have. And that’s what will kill the relationship—any relationship. But especially Chi, who’s pretty much been Needed To Death his whole life.

I’m not even going to write down what Rory’s Nodes say. They’re hiLARious. North Node Six, South Twelve, North Sagittarius, South Gemini. You can look that one up. Basically, although the available interpretations of this axis are more nebulous (and some of the astrologers writing them are a little woo-woo), it’s everything Chi ever told me about her.

 

So today I’m watching myself plot and plot, long and long, and I see that I’m just, once again, trying to force someone to do something FOR ME.

 

And I realize two things: It’s absolutely VITAL that I learn to just be in this life, without thoughts of this person in my head all the time and of how much I miss him and want to be with him. Those are the seeds of a sick, enmeshed relationship, and I’m already running the ship aground long before it ever comes in.

And really: If I can just get my mind to relax out of those thoughts for a minute, see how much better that feels? What’s wrong with just going along, going to work every day, and writing and living my life? Nothing. I think that relationship would have been the best, and I feel sad because that reality isn’t my reality; but you know, I’ve read the codependency books and all Chi’s worst transits. There are very good ones, but there are also very BAD ones. It’s clear what kind of hell I could be in for.

 

A really, really sick unhealed codependent who isn’t getting better is NO PICNIC. (Chi knows that. Rory is one, too.)

 

And I know that. I spent thirty-eight years with my mother.

 

We should never assume the best possible outcome will be ours, or just blindly assume we can handle the worst. I never knew my aunt and cousin would be such a nightmare, and look what I did to myself there.

 

And in being so needy, I call forth the WORST, NOT the best.

And then it was almost as if a voice spoke to me, as I saw that one of my motivations here is a good one: I know this person wants a relationship with someone that’s like the best parts of the one we had (and I don’t know, with Rory, maybe he’s still wanting it!) And I do, too, and part of my motivation is a helpful motivation: that of helping us get there.

 

But if a person isn’t ready to do what it takes, a person isn’t ready to do what it takes. And neediness just results in pretending, acting, and lies on the part of that CODEPENDENT person who really isn’t ready, and who keeps shying away from doing his childhood recovery work.

 

And that breaks down over the long run. Unfortunately, because Chi is so consummate an actor, shoulding himself into absolutely inhuman misery and smiling all the while (“We’re all fine, here. Thank you!”) the process is invisible, and reveals itself over way too many years to be workable at our ages. Twenty more years of avoiding our childhood recovery work, and we don’t get another chance at anything other than drooling into our laps in the nursing home.

 

And this voice inside said to me, “If and when this soul is ready to move forward, he will let you know.”

 

And if he doesn’t, that’s my answer.

 

You can’t MAKE anyone ready to move forward, ready to do their recovery work, ready to make any change in their life. (And I know this; I lived with my mother.) And if you try…DISASTER.

 

I have to relax and trust that this person just isn’t ready yet, and when or if he ever is, he will let me know.

 

And my job until then, or until some other wonderful man shows up, or until I die alone, is to become successful at living alone.

 

And you aren’t doing that when your mind is constantly occupied with wanting a thing that isn’t here.

Sometimes you simply have no control, and you have to accept your life the way it is. And that’s EXACTLY what this forthcoming transit, spanning a prospective relationship that also appears in Chi’s chart AND Rory’s, is telling me: STAY OUT OF THE NEED TO BULLY AND CONTROL THE OUTCOME, AND LET WHATEVER IS BE. And Chi’s and my Davison: the relationship only has a chance of doing well if I’m capable of standing alone.

 

There’s nothing BAD about this life, really. It’s just that Chi isn’t in it. And I’m afraid he may never be. I don’t want anyone else; just him.

 

Oh, well; oh FUCKING well.

 

It’s that soul’s sovereign choice whether it wants to evolve out of codependency and low self esteem in this lifetime or not, and who with—and the man is almost sixty. It’s quite possible his answer is, “This is too hard for me. No, thanks. Maybe next time.”

 

This can’t happen because I need it for me; it has to happen because he needs it for him.

 

NO ONE ELSE in this person’s life seems able to RESPECT HIS CHOICE. (And that’s partially because he isn’t able to, either.)

 

Fundamentally, this is my most important job, with respect to him.

 

With respect to me, my most important job is to become successful at living alone and taking care of myself.

Torturing myself does NOT fall in that job description. Neither does hanging onto someone who’s not ready to change, and trying to force him to. That just tortures all three people involved. If Rory’s going to lose her husband because she can’t wake up and treat him better, that’s going to be painful enough; she doesn’t need me making it worse, tugging Chi back and forth in an “I’m-ready-no-I’m-not” dance that lasts SEVEN YEARS.

 

That doesn’t mean I don’t love Chi, or that I wouldn’t take him back in a minute, with open arms, if he wanted to be here and showed me motivation and at least some aptitude at resolving the Twin Death Clowns of Codependency and Low Self Worth.

 

If I ever want to be capable of happiness and health with Chi, or with anyone else who might enter my life, I have to be capable of happiness even if no one ever shows up again and I die all alone. Achieving that capability DOES NOT MEAN I don’t love Chi dearly. It just means I’m not using his absence to trash my own life, or anyone else’s, and that I retain the ability to find happiness no matter what someone else does or does not do.

 

If everyone else in Chi’s life could give the person Chi really is, that same dignity, he might have done a lot better a lot sooner. Respecting someone else’s choices is perhaps the highest form of love there is. I can still give him that one, even if I never see him or hear from him again. How do I love thee? By respecting your choice to be where and as you are, no matter what I think of it, or what I would have wanted for you, me, or us. That you have from me, Chi, forever. I love you.

 

Like it or not, my life is going to go on without Chi in it, exactly the same as it is without Simon—who would have been seventy today.

 

I feel the loss of them both deeply, and the loss of all the things we might have been, all the things we might have done. I’m sorry those things will not happen in this lifetime, deeply, deeply sorry. They could have been great things, and they will not happen. I think that’s why I can’t let go; because I’m so sorry they will not. Because I’m sure that nothing, anywhere, could ever be or have been as good.

 

But grieving, raging, and manipulating won’t change what’s happened. All that does is replace the good outcomes that could have been left, with bad ones.

What I wanted, and maybe what Chi still wants, too, as of this writing, will not happen. But my life will continue anyway.

 

Happily or unhappily, is my job and my choice.

 

Everything has to be okay the way it is.